Cheng Danan

Cheng Dan’an:a famous acupuncturist (1899-1957), who set up a society of acupuncture research and then a special school for training acupuncturists. His chief writings include the Zhong Guo Zhen Jiu Zhi Liao Xue (Chinese Acupuncture-Moxibustion Therapy), the Zhen Jiu Jing Hua (Quintessence of Acupuncture and Moxibustion),and the Zhong Guo Zhen Jiu Xue (Chinese Acupuncture and Moxibustion).

“In the early 1930s, Cheng Danan, a Chinese scholar-physician, used Euroamerican anatomy to rehabilitate acupuncture as a respectable skill. In Chinese Acupuncture and Moxibustion Therapeutics, Cheng (1932) insisted that acupuncture must be an effective medical therapy, because its mechanism of action was the stimulation of the nerves described in European medical theory. Cheng insisted that the acupuncture points be redefined in light of this insight; in his book, he repositioned them away from blood vessels (where previously they might have been used for bloodletting) and toward the nerve pathways. He illustrated his revisions by painting the new acupuncture pathways onto the skin of volunteers and then photographing them, a technique that gave his book a greater air of modernity and reflected the increasingly common use of photographic illustrations in European medical books of the time. Cheng’s new scientific acupuncture was a great success in China. His book went through many editions from 1930 to 1960, and he set up his own college of acupuncture. Cheng achieved such prominence in the Chinese medical community that after the Communist takeover in 1949, he was asked to serve on several national committees in charge of medical policy and education. Chengs work helped acupuncture regain sufficient credibility to be reincorporated into the teaching and practice of the new Chinese medicine. In the 1950s, however, Cheng abandoned his own earlier insistence that acupuncture must work through the nerves alone. Instead, he attributed its efficacy to the power of qi and the doctor-patient relationship, in addition to the physical stimulation of the nerves”.Acupuncture and the Reinvention of Chinese Medicine. Andrews BJ. APS Bulletin. 1999;9(3).Cheng Danan. [Chinese acupuncture and moxibustion therapeutics] Zhongguo zhenjiu zhiliaoxue. Shanghai: Quanqingtang shuju. 1932.1935 : un premier écho chinois d’une acupuncture française. Franzini S. Revue Française d’Acupuncture. 1992;70:21-4.
L’auteur fait une traduction et un commentaire d’un article chinois de 1935 de Cheng Danan, tiré du premier périodique chinois d’acupuncture, où il apparaît que l’acupuncture était alors menacée de disparition en Chine même, et que pour la défendre on s’est appuyé sur l’intérêt européen pour la discipline, tout particulièrement sur le travail de George Soulié de Morant.

Cheng Dan-an was the single most important Chinese acupuncturist of the mid-20th century. He created the modern acupuncture college curriculum in China and rescued acupuncture and moxibustion from oblivion in its native land. As a teacher of many other famous teachers of acupuncture, such as the late Dr. James Tin Yau So, Cheng Dan-an is the father of modern Chinese acupuncture. This book is a collection of his formulas and treatments for a wide range of traditional Chinese diseases, such as cold damage, warm heat diseases, wind stroke, mania, diarrhea and dysentery, cough, phlegm rheum, panting & wheezing, the five accumulations, and more. This is a seminal book in the development of modern acupuncture which should not be overlooked by any Western practitioner. We chose to publish this book even though most Westerners have never heard of Cheng Dan-an because, if one does know a little something about the modern Chinese history of acupuncture, one has to know about the tremendous role Cheng played throughout the entire middle part of this century. This book can either be used as a stand alone treatment manual, or it can be read as a seminal transition text from premodern to modern Chinese acupuncture. In particular, students of Dr. James Tin Yao So in the early days of the New England School of Acupuncture will find this book extremely enlightening, since it is the source for many of their teacher’s treatments and ideas.

Mr CHENG Dan-an is a famous educationist and acupuncturist in modern China. He established the earliest acupuncture correspondence institution named Chinese Research Society of Acu-moxibustion. Meanwhile he founded the earliest professional magazine, Journal of Acu-moxibustion which played an important role in promoting redevelopment of acu-moxibustion. Mr CHENG Dan-an wrote many famous works. Research on CHENG’sacademic thoughts and works will help a lot in knowing the development and evolution of modern acupuncturology in the period of the Republic of China. The present paper introduces it by the help of 7 books including Zhenjiu Zhiliao Xue (Chinese Acu-moxibustion Therapeutics).